Ashya’s family ‘blown away’ after public dig deep to fund treatment

The family of five-year-old brain tumour patient Ashya King have been “blown away” by the support they have received, a family friend said.

The boy’s parents, Brett and Naghmeh King, were back at his bedside yesterday at the Materno-Infantil hospital in Malaga.

The couple, who were arrested on Saturday after removing their son from Southampton General Hospital against medical advice, were reunited with him on Wednesday following a public outcry.

Speaking outside the Spanish hospital yesterday, family friend Daniel Pask, 35, said Ashya was in the “best position we can hope for” but the family were continuing to look into treatment options.

He added: “They want to say thank you so much for the support. They’re blown away by the generosity of people in this case. They’re trying to wrap their heads around it.

“They’re just a normal family and they’ve had this amazing response from the public and the press.

“All that support is wonderful, absolutely fantastic.”

The couple were freed from Soto del Real prison in Madrid on Tuesday night after British authorities abandoned their attempts to extradite them, amid a public backlash.

A fundraising page set up to help pay for treatment has so far raised more than £41,000, while Chesterfield-based charity Kids’n’CancerUK said it had agreed to pay the £100,000 needed for Ashya’s treatment, plus living costs after donors pledged £35,000 in 24 hours.

Yesterday David Cameron said common sense had prevailed.

He told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “I think in the end common sense won out and this poor child has been reunited with his family, but it is tragic they were separated.”